How to Prove That God Exists:
‘Go to Sunday School and Ask’

I am writing this to you because I want you to know God. I believe that God did send Jesus to die on the cross for my sins and that I am saved by grace through faith. I can tell you that I have lived the way you believe and now I could not see myself without
God. The evidence lives everywhere you look. Take the planets, did you know that they have nothing in common? They all are different. Some have rings and some don’t and they do not even rotate in the same direction. Their atmospheres are not even the
same. And if things just appeared from nowhere, why is this still not evident today? I see things disappearing rather than poof here it is. And evolution, still no missing link and guess what they will never find it. To this date, scientist have never found
a link between different species. Just total complete species with no evidence of evolving from any other. And quite frankly, I am offended that someone could say we evolved from apes. If this were true, why is there numerous species still existing in just
about every area we do? And why would there be numerous flowers, trees, animals, and sea dwelling creatures, that are different species, still in existence, if everything came from a single piece of algae or otherwise. Quite frankly, the world is so complex
in all aspects that I do not see evolution in the picture at all. Have you seen a frog turn into a alligator lately? Well, if the Big Bang Theory is what you believe then let me say this.... if a bomb exploded, wouldn’t you find all of the fragments
to be of the same material? Wouldn’t you find them in an unorganized mess? No organization ever came from an explosion! And there is plenty to support that argument.

I hope that this makes sense to you or gives you something to think about. If you still doubt, test yourself, go to Sunday school (not just 1 time) ask the congregation what drives them to believe and what happened in their life to change the way they
believe. Study those people and do your own experiment. Ask them if there is someone who witnesses to them or is a living example of truth, happiness, and Godliness. If there is one way to prove yourself right, do these things. I’m sure it would make
a great article for your magazine. If you do this, would you please let me know how your experiment went. One day I may share my story with you if you are interested.... it could be a mini series. ha!ha!

If you want to make bold (unfounded) claims, you must be willing to bring forth evidence and strong argument in favor of your claim.

Your entire treatise, here, is neither science nor argument; rather, it consists of statements — claims — which contain scientific-sounding language but which show a lack of even the basic knowledge that we can expect somebody who is
educated in the sciences to reflexively display. What you wrote to us is no more reliable than the “Letters to the Editor” section of a local newspaper, where they print letters simply for having diverse opinions, not for being accurate presentations
of fact.

Your understanding of cosmology does not square with science itself; your understanding of the Big Bang model is wholly flawed, as is your understanding of the theory of evolution. Nobody apart from those who are already hostile to the Big Bang model and
the theory of evolution have ever described them the way you describe them here!

I will not continue, because the actual claims made by scientists are easily found on Web sites such as Victor Stenger’s “AVoid” (for “Atoms in the Void”) site
(where you’ll learn the actual claims made by those who accept the Big Bang model; you can find out how it is that the god-claims made by those Evangelical Christians who are so busy
in the United States are subject to scientific scrutiny — and why they fail such tests; discover how to show that the “anthropic
principle” of the “Intelligent Design” proponents and others has no basis in the body of knowledge currently accepted among the majority of scientists other than the scientific-sounding words these authors use). Go to the anti-Creationism
site hosted by the prestigious National Academy of Sciences (America’s most respected scientific society). Check out the tongue-in-cheek Project
Steve, a group of 521 (at this writing) credentialed scientists named Steve (or: Stephen; Steven; Stephanie; Stefan; Etienne; Esteban; etc.) who oppose any teaching of Creationism as science in America’s public schools, erected as a quasi-joke
in honor of In honor of the late Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002), a valiant opponent of Creationism, and commenting on the practice of Christian Creationists who circulate statements denouncing evolution that have been signed by as many scientists (in whatever
field) as they can muster, hoping to portray evolution as a theory in crisis (which it is not, as evidenced by the vast number of scientists — just named Steve — who support its teaching in the schools).

You will do much better with your propaganda campaign if you stick with trying to recruit those who do not care enough about the truth to scrutinize the various claims that they hear. Those are the people who place a higher priority on feeling good, having
friends, “keeping up with the Joneses,” thinking that everything’s gonna be okay, and assuring one another that “God” is looking after us, that He made puppies and sunsets, and that He will eventually send all the unbelievers
(and those who join the wrong religion) into everlasting torture.

On the other hand, if what you really want to do is find out (as close as possible) what the truth actually is, then I assure you that this can be done. It is possible to study very hard, to learn how to discern truthfulness
from persuasive propaganda and to distinguish passionate curiosity from agenda-laced greed.

If what you want to do is sales-pitch religion with success, you’ve sent your e-mail to the wrong address.

Cliff Walker
“Positive Atheism” Magazine
Entering our 10th year of service
to people with no reason to believe

I am sorry if I came across in this manner. I was hoping that your response would not be so hostile and a little more civil. I should have expected negatism from someone who publishes for “Positive” Atheism. If you will do the research
I am sure you will find this to be correct. Did you decide to do the experiment? I do not have to defend my argument and should not expect you to either. I thought you might be up for a challenge or are you afraid?

What experiment? Enter a Christian church and see if the members therein will try to pitch the Christian faith to me? Here’s an “experiment” for you: politely correct the falsehoods that your religious leaders have trained you to spew
forth in the name of Christ. With the falsehood out of the picture, that is, by being honest and above board with me, can you still accuse me of being hostile in response? (Of course I’m hostile to those who teach falsehood, though I needn’t
be impolite about it like you suggest I am! It’s just that people often take it very personally when somebody criticizes an idea they hold dear

If you will do the research I am sure you will find this to be correct.

I have spent the bulk of my life unraveling the mess I got myself into as a young man when, thinking I could use some “direction” in my life, I joined a Southern California Evangelical Christian megachurch. Indeed, I have done my research in
this respect. While I am not a research scientist, I have deferred to the opinions of those research scientists who have opined on the matters you claim to be hoaxes perpetrated by the vast majority of the World’s scientists. But I have, as “research” goes,
collected and collated thousands of hours of my own reading in the subjects of natural selection and cosmology — specifically for the purpose of settling, in my own mind, what happened to me so many years ago, and discovering how it is that I could
possibly have been so thoroughly taken advantage of by these ruthless and unfeeling sharks with Bibles in their hands and college freshmen in their mouths.

Ah, but we notice that you didn’t lift a finger toward demonstrating any truthfulness that might exist in your claim (like I asked you to do). This is a clear indication that even you don’t believe the claims that your religious leaders
have told you to tell us. If you believed it, you would eagerly defend it. Since you refuse to defend your claims against our challenges, I’m left with one of two choices. Perhaps you don’t understand the words and sentences that you have memorized
(and you thus don’t believe them yourself, since one cannot believe what one does not understand, but, rather, merely reels off meaningless sounds). Or maybe you do understand what you say, realizing either that this is a ruse designed to lure
simpleminded, uneducated, and other wise defenseless folks into the church or that this is a scam to garner the votes of excitable Evangelicals whose collective education was acquired from the pulpit, the television set, and the back fence.

I was hoping that your response would not be so hostile and a little more civil.

I challenge anybody to come up with a truthful handling of your attempts to deceive, and do that using a greater degree of civility than I showed to you in my first reply.

It is clear to us that you’re in the habit of seeing hostility and “negatism” (whatever that is) wherever you want to see it; that is, wherever your prejudiced presuppositions prompt you to think it exists. Behaving this
way is much easier than facing the fact that the position to which you have dedicated your life is hopelessly flawed, is based primarily in lies and bigotry, and is the tool of political exploiters (and has been all these things since the Christian religion
was invented during the years following Rome’s destruction of Jerusalem).

When you call our response negative and hostile, you are trying to bait atheists into responding precisely how you presuppose all atheists would respond. Of course! Whenever anybody acts rudely toward another, she or he will respond in a less-than-dignified
manner: indignity is the proper response to abusive behavior when it has been initiated by a pest. In fact, you seem to be fully aware that by being a nuisance, your victims cannot but respond in ways that are consistent with your opinions of them.
This ruse is popular among those who haven’t the depth to hold a reasoned discussion of topics that they find objectionable.

Of course, had you bothered to read some of our Letters Section exchanges, you could have easily predicted this to be our response.

Had I simply ignored you, however, your response would likely be one of gloating: you’d tell yourself (and anybody within ear-shot) that your arguments are impenetrable, that our silence indicates an inability to challenge your oh-so-formidable arguments!

All of this has little if anything to do with religion and atheism; rather, it has everything to do with your own dishonesty.

In the end, such dishonesty demonstrates the sheer powerlessness of this particular religion to make or people moral or to enable them behave morally.

Have a nice life, okay?

Cliff Walker
“Positive Atheism” Magazine
Entering our 10th year of service
to people with no reason to believe